German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said he hasn’t given up hope that a ceasefire can be secured in Ukraine, but he’s "not under any illusions either.”

"I am preparing myself inwardly for the possibility that this war could go on for a long time,” Merz said in an interview on Sunday with public broadcaster ZDF in which he also rejected a proposal by his coalition partner, the Social Democrats, to increase taxes in Germany.

Now in its fourth year, Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine is the longest war in Europe since World War II.